SAN DIEGO — For Latinos, the 2020 Democratic primary is only now getting under way. In Nevada.

Iowans took their first-in-the-nation status more seriously than they did the integrity of the caucusing process, which resulted in a debacle.

New Hampshire is like a cozy club where voters can’t decide who to support until all the candidates have been to the house for coffee and cake.

But Nevada. Now there is a real state. It’s got size, diversity, crosscurrents, special interests and a complex political philosophy. And it doesn’t give 2 cents what Washington thinks about anything.

Nor do Nevadans have any desire to be like California, despite the fact that Las Vegas sometimes feels like a far eastern suburb of Los Angeles.

According to the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, Californians account for 20%-25% of the 43 million people who visit the city each year. Many of them stay. According to U.S. Census Bureau estimates, more than 50,000 Californians moved to Nevada between July 2017 and July 2018.

Given that I live on this side of the state line, I wouldn’t dare try to speak for Nevadans. But I listen really well when they speak to me.

I got an earful during a recent three-day visit to Las Vegas, where I appeared on a podcast as part of a political panel at the College of Southern Nevada. What I heard loud and clear was an independent streak from people who have no use for party labels and prefer solutions to partisan wrangling. Nevadans love their guns and want lower taxes, but they also care about water, education and the environment.

Former Gov. Brian Sandoval epitomized the state’s ethos. The Latino Republican and former judge wasn’t afraid to butt heads with GOP leaders over what he considered their wrongheaded immigration proposals. In 2012, when Mitt Romney suggested that the undocumented might simply “self-deport” if we were mean to them, Sandoval told the presidential nominee of his own party to pound sand. Romney lost that election, while Sandoval retired with a sky-high approval rating.

Latinos account for 6.2% of the population in Iowa, and 3.9% of the people in New Hampshire. Those puny figures put those states way out of step in an election where Latinos — who were already a swing vote, thanks to up-for-grabs Mexicans and Mexican Americans who make up most of the community — now also account for the majority of eligible voters.

Nevada, meanwhile, is 30% Latino. So it’s a more reliable barometer for a country that is on pace to hit that mark in 20 years. And it’s not just about demographics. It’s about power. Latino immigrants are — along with gaming and unions — one of the big economic and political forces in Nevada. All three sides of the triangle are co-dependent, and so no one has an interest in going to war with any other side.

This dynamic is different than what you find in the Rust Belt states — Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin. In those states, the interests of Latino immigrants — chief among them legalization — are often at odds with those of the mostly white labor unions, many of whose members don’t want to compete with hardworking Latino immigrants. It’s a tug of war, and a headache for Democrats who always side with unions.

Nevada is also where Julián Castro, the leading Latino to run for president in 2020, was supposed to break through. But now that the former secretary of housing and urban development has dropped out of the race and endorsed Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren — who turned in a pair of disappointing finishes in Iowa and New Hampshire — the Latino vote is a crapshoot.

First, Latinos don’t normally respond to attempts to get them to transfer support from one candidate to another. Second, even when Castro was in the race, the Texan didn’t have a lock on Latinos; he gave up support from older Latinos to former Vice President Joe Biden and enthusiasm among younger Latinos to Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders. And third, the field is in chaos.

The Warren campaign has the stink of death on it. Biden could rebound with a good showing in Nevada, but it may be too late to save his campaign. And Sanders is making a hard last-minute pitch for Latino support. Meanwhile, former South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg couldn’t name the president of Mexico during a recent Nevada interview. And Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar doesn’t seem to know a churro from a chimichanga.

Welcome to the West, folks. Watch your step. In these parts, politics is as wild as it gets.